Middle East

Oct. 04, 2018 | 12:04 AM

U.S. terminates 1955 treaty with Iran

Judges enter the International Court of Justice, or World Court, in The Hague, Netherlands, Wednesday, Oct. 3, 2018, where they ruled on an Iranian request to order Washington to suspend U.S. sanctions against Tehran. (AP Photo/Peter Dejong)

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In response to a U.N. court order that the U.S. lift sanctions on Iran, the Trump administration said Wednesday it was terminating a decades-old treaty affirming friendly relations between the two countries.

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said withdrawing from the 1955 Treaty of Amity was long overdue and followed Iran "groundlessly" bringing a complaint with the International Court of Justice challenging U.S. sanctions on the basis that they were a violation of the pact.

Meanwhile, National Security Adviser John Bolton said the administration also was pulling out of an amendment to the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations that Iran or others, notably the Palestinians, could use to sue the U.S. at The Hague-based tribunal.

Bolton, who last month unleashed a torrent of criticism against the International Criminal Court, noted that previous Republican administrations had pulled out of various international agreements and bodies over "politicized cases". He said the administration would review all accords that might subject the U.S. to prosecution by international courts or panels.

Amid a broader push to assert U.S. sovereignty in the international arena and after pulling out of the Iran nuclear deal this year, the administration determined that the court case made the treaty irrelevant.